


Daylight

by tatertotarmy



Category: Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World
Genre: Gen, Pre-Canon, Takes place at the end of Tales of Symphonia, Tales Series Secret Santa
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-26
Updated: 2016-12-26
Packaged: 2018-09-12 11:34:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,503
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9069877
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tatertotarmy/pseuds/tatertotarmy
Summary: Before the worlds were combined, Richter was locked in the basement of Sybak with the rest of the half-elves. His only contact being the others below, and a boy named Aster.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Merry Christmas to Asterlaker on Twitter! I'm your secret santa!

Richter hardly knew the sun nowadays.

He knew the principals of the sun. Its alignment in orbit of Tethe’alla, the approximate heat it generated, how far it was from the surface, the time it took for Tethe’alla to orbit the sun, when the moon Sylvarant would intersect in front of it. But he hardly knew what it really meant to humans and elves on the surface. The heat on his skin, the flare that stung his eyes and reflected over smudges on his glasses, the difference between day and night. Those had all vanished in favor of numbers now, numbers calculated in the basement of the Imperial Research Facility, where the only lights were dim, flickering lightbulbs from the ceiling and the small glow of screens and technology the half-elves were provided with.

The sun had become a picture on his monitor, only useful in tests and studies regarding mana. How long had it been since he had been outside? Since any of the half-elf scientists had gone outside? He had only been thirteen when he had been sent to work down underground, where all the unwanted of Tethe’alla dwelled. Had it been four years since then? Five? 

Honestly, five was perhaps the shortest time out of most of the half-elves in the basement lab. Everyone looked young…but it was because of the longer lifespan, wasn’t it? Richter was the only one who actually looked his age, looking a rough eighteen and not deceptively so. Some of the older half-elves always got disgusted looks from the older, human members of the research facility, as if they had seen the lack of change throughout the years.

He looked at his reflection on an empty monitor. Just how long would he look like this? Decades? Centuries?

“Richter!”

He blinked, looking up from the monitor to see a smaller boy cutting through the equipment, some tall enough that Richter could only see a messy tuft of blond hair.

It was him again. The weird human child. Aster.

Aster came to the research lab soon after Richter was locked up in the basement, and always had been known as the ‘different’ human throughout all the half-elves down there. A nine-year-old prodigy with absolutely no sense of the world around him, walking to the beat of his own drum. Richter remembered Aster’s arrival well, a little boy who marched down to the basement and greeted all the half-elves as if they were equals. Kate, one of the half-elves, nearly had a heart attack when the boy came at her so fast.

And since Richter was thirteen at the time, closest in age, Aster had latched onto him for nearly every project. Richter didn’t know whether that was a good thing or a bad thing.

“What do you want?” Richter found himself asking, not planning to ignore the kid for once. 

Aster stepped over a printer on the ground, grinning up at Richter, ignoring whatever sour expression was on his face. His lab coat hung off his hands, still a little too big for his fourteen year old frame, and tucked away under his arm was a binder that Richter had sent up before. A binder full of research on the summon spirits and the distribution of mana throughout Tethe’alla. Richter had completed it months ago, and had only sent it up through an indirect inter-facility mailing system. Couldn’t have half-elves freely going upstairs, of course. Sometimes he wondered whether Aster had even received it.

“I’ve figured something out! I’ve been taking some readings on the mana levels lately,” Aster hoisted up the binder and put it on the table beside Richter with a resounding thump, blowing away some of the smaller notes near the keyboard, “And something’s different these past few months!”

“Different?” Richter asked, eyebrow raising as he swiveled around the chair to face Aster.

“The mana isn’t moving anymore.”

“Huh?” 

“I’m serious,” Aster flipped open the binder – paying no mind to when the cover knocked over a stack of crumpled up paper – and turned to data that had been compiled over the years, “Mana always has a flow from the temples. Mana is always flowing out of it. But…when I went to study the Temple of Lightning…it was just stagnant.”

“Is the spirit still there?”

“I couldn’t check,” Aster brushed some long strands of blond from his eyes, “I wanted to…but none of the scientists would allow it. Liability issue, they said.”

Richter snorted, “That’s because they can’t fight.”

“And you can?”

“I practice.”

Aster smiled widely, “Then next time, you can come with me!”

“You’ve forgotten something.”

“What?”

“Half-elf.”

“Oh, what does that even matter, anyway?” Aster pouted, “Your estimations are always accurate. If you can fight, then we could actually make some solid predictions! Figure out what’s stagnating the mana flow.”

Richter sighed, “I said I could fight. I didn’t say I could fight well.”

“Oh, you can fight,” Aster smiled brightly, “Because you seem like a great fighter! Better than any I’ve seen!”

Richter couldn’t help but chuckle sarcastically, “And you’ve never seen me fight. What is that supposed to tell me?”

“Well…I think you’re great, and that you’re going to only get greater,” Aster scratched the back of his head, clearing his throat before Richter could reply, “Well anyway…the mana isn’t moving. We have plenty of it, and when I checked the Temple of Darkness, things weren’t normal over there, either. It’s just...weird that mana wasn’t flowing at either temple.”

“You only checked those two temples?”

“Partners wanted to come back after one. I could only persuade them for two.”

“Right.”

“It’s stupid, though,” Aster groaned, closing the binder, “If one of the temples has stopped a mana flow, then what happens when the rest do? If I could actually get what I need to get done, then I could actually see what’s going on. And the best person for the job is stuck down here.”

“Hey, I’ve never even been to the temple. At least you can go into the field.”

“Fieldwork is useless without a good team,” Aster sighed, “One day, something’s going to happen that’s much more important, where you’ll need to go out.”

“Scientists don’t believe in little predictions like that.”

“And good scientists shouldn’t stay underground.”

“Well that’s just how life is, Aster. Not everyone’s a prodigy,” Richter leaned back in his chair, “You think it has to do with Sylvarant? The other world?”

“I’m not sure. We can’t exactly go study over there, even if it was,” Aster sighed, “Is there anything else you can think of that would cause it?”

“I think you need to get researchers and bodyguards with more balls.”

“Then you.”

“Within the realm of possibility.”

“Can’t I just sneak you out?” Aster rose an eyebrow, “Those Sylvaranti got out fine. What were their names…Lloyd…the chosen…and the rest of them? I didn’t pay too much attention.”

“They shut that passage out as soon as they found out,” Richter chuckled, “You should have been a fly on the wall in that exchange. Might have given you a little perspective.”

“Of what, the impossible?”

“I don’t think getting out here to be my partner in research is impossible.”

“Your partner?” Richter couldn’t help but smile, “I thought you wanted a bodyguard.”

“W-Well…both! I-I meant both!” Aster answered turning away and scratching the back of his head a little. 

Honestly, Aster wore his admiration on his sleeve.

“Aster!” the door to the first floor opened, casting bright, fluorescent list onto the dim basement, “Are you still down there?”

“Oh! Yes!” Aster called out, quickly shutting the binder and putting it back under his arm before looking at Richter, “I’ll be back soon, alright?”

“Just do what you need,” Richter spoke passively, waving off the younger boy as he hurried back up the stairs. Back to a world that Richter and the rest of the half-elves were shut out from.

Richter sighed, turning back to his monitor.

Then, there was a shake. An earthquake.

The lights went out, electricity sparking. Richter stood up, looking around as everything around him shook. He looked up and saw the lights shaking above. Richter made a break for the stairs so he could get outside, to not get crushed. Just as he put his foot on the first step, the shaking stopped.

He was silent for a while, and he heard the calls of the half-elves who had been sleeping. Just before he went to check on the equipment, the door opened again.

“Richter!”

He looked up to Aster, who was breathing heavily as if he had ran a mile. In his hands was a small radio that was buzzing about something peculiar. New towns appearing where they hadn’t before. The continent taking a different shape. Contact with the people of Sylvarant, right in the same plane of existence. 

“Richter, let’s go!” Aster called out, stepping back to hold the door open, “It’s a whole new world out there.”


End file.
